My, How We've Grown! (Some of ) The Decadent Team

Heather Bennett (owner) ~ 2nd Grade

Colleen Beilke ~ Review Coordinator

Lisa Omstead (owner)

Kathleen Gallagher

Why don't they leave me alone? I have no time for photo shoots. There are more important things on my mind. 

Shiela Stewart:

This is back when I was sweet and innocent. And then I grew up! Muhahahahahaha!!

                               Valerie Mann 

First time in the snow... BEFORE

 

                                                                                           ...and AFTER

and what's up with the Bozo the Clown boots? I have big feet, but really??

Mahalia Levey

 

Leanne Dyck (The Sweater Curse):  "My huge head full of words waiting to put pen to paper." (Picture taken in 1962 by my Dad)

Ellen Keener ~ 

First, I always liked cars better than Barbie.  Second, can you tell that Mom always cut my hair, and I hated it? When we lived in Winchester, the neighbors actually had to explain to friends once that the screaming coming from our backyard wasn't because I was dying  - it was just Rich (my mom) cutting Vanessa's hair.

Wendy Burke

From a very young age, Wendy Burke was destined to be full of hot air.

 

Ashlynn Monroe

 Silke Juppenlatz

This was umm... 1965 or so.

Looks like I managed to water everything -- except the dilapidated plant which is crying out for some... water!
That’s what I call precision splashing, it takes a lot of practice!

Leslie Soule

Blood Moon Playlist

by Ellen Keener

“Music is what feeling sounds like.” -Unknown

I don’t know about the rest of the world, I couldn’t live without music. I play it all day – for my students in class when they’re working, after they leave when I’m planning. While I clean, and most especially when I write.

Think about it. Different days call for different genres. Happy days are light-hearted ballads and upbeat, cheerful pop tunes. Bad days or sad days are dark metal with soaring vocals or Widor organ toccatas where the bass notes rumble in your breastbone and the neighbors hate your guts.

Sometimes the best way to get past a difficult scene, or get my head into a story is to listen to the music I’ve chosen to go with it. I make playlists for specific novels, for scenes, even for specific characters and/or emotions. I’ve been known to loop a single song (So She Dances by Josh Groban comes to mind) until my roommate probably wanted to kill me.

So I’ve decided to share a part of the playlist for Blood Moon. (My playlists are long. I won’t bore you with the entire thing.) I’ve identified what scenes a few of them “go with.”



1. All for Love – Bryan Adams, Rod Stewart, Sting
2. So She Dances – Josh Groban (This and All for Love were the two songs used for the proposal scene)
3. Bossy – Kelis
4. Day ‘n’ Nite – Kid Cudi
5. Give Me A Sign – Breaking Benjamin
6. Gotta Be Somebody – Nickleback
7. Hero – Skillet
8. I Miss You – Blink-182
9. In The Air Tonight – Phil Collins
10. Via Con Me – Paolo Conte
11. Black Spider – Sunday Driver
12. Rain – Creed
13. The Bird and the Worm (Instrumental) – The Used
14. Just Like You Imagined – Nine Inch Nails (Part of the ending fight scene)
15. I’ve Got a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts – Danny Kaye (Yup. It goes with Thaddeus.)
16. Can’t Take It In – Imogen Heap
17. Mi Morena – Josh Groban (Love scene)

Thanks for stopping by and reading (or listening!) What things inspire you? If you’ve read Blood Moon, do these match what YOU thought? I’d love to hear what you think!

Just the Facts Friday with Ellen Keener

Hello All! Thanks for stopping by to see my contribution to Just the Facts Friday. We’ll see if I can make this interesting enough for you….

Seven things most people don’t know about Ellen Keener:

1. If I were ever to become President my first act of office would be to institute Chick-fil-A all over the country. Not just because I find it against all good sense that they disappear in the northern states. Also because everyone needs their ice tea. I drink ice tea 24 hours a day. Seriously. If the world runs out of all ice tea, I’ll die.
2. I browse places like Home Depot and Ace Hardware for fun. I’m a tech ed teacher, but also do mixed media. You know, in my free time. The hardware store in town has a couple of very nice older gentlemen who always check in on me anxiously because they don’t understand why I’m muttering to myself while holding plumbing fittings and dowel rods and looking at the nuts and bolts but not the screws that go with them.
3. I can wiggle my ears. Hey, maybe not the most unique of talents, but it comes in handy for truth or dare.
4. I’m a twenty-something and I live in the middle of nowhere and like it. It’s good that I have a roommate who’s social, or I’d probably never get out much. The only downside? If it rains too much, I have waterfront property, but I can’t leave and enjoy it because my car can’t get through the water.
5. I am the biggest dork in the world. I watch PBS like its everyone else’s reality television, buy every version of Pride and Prejudice and Jane Eyre ever made, and got more excited over my Two Fat Ladies DVD collection than all the other gifts my best friends got me combined.
6. I used to be an administrator at a gifted summer camp. I have actually had to say to children, “no, just because you file your teeth down and watch the moon, you are NOT a vampire.” I have also been accused of allowing students to blow up toilets and fill a building with crap. Literally.
7. Last, and my best friend claims this is one of my weirder qualities, I never eat both ends of French fries or pickles. I don’t know why either. It’s a thing. And yes, I pick which end is edible and which isn’t. Now you see another reason I love Chick-fil-a? No ends on the fries!

Here’s hoping you’ve been entertained for a few minutes. I hope you’ll take a few more and read about my novel, Blood Moon. Hopefully I’ll have something else out soon. Its in the process of editing at the moment.

Thanks!

10Q Tuesday with Ellen Keener

10 things you didn't know about Ellen...

How did you start your writing career?

Well, I've been writing as long as I can remember. The first book I remember finishing was Webby and the Tar Monster. About a dinosaur and a...well...tar monster. If you mean seriously started, it was probably three years ago. I've dabbled at writing and submitting things, but three years ago I finally looked at the version of Blood Moon I'd been working on at the time and said, "finish the damn book. You can do this." I found a great critique group, and the rest is history.

Tell us about your current release.

Well, I think the blurb sums it up pretty nicely: Fugitive shifter, Aria Legreve, is always on the run. With her own life at risk, she helps a badly beaten shifter to his Pack, knowing the danger her meddling entails. Hoping to use her status as an Outcast and be set free, her world changes when she meets head on with no other than her Mate—who is dead.

Alpha Lukas MacLeod has been searching for his wife for the past year, until Aria walks straight into his lair. Fate intervenes and gives them a second chance. Caught up in an intricate web of lies and prophecies in the making for generations, Aria and Lukas must discover a way to balance the darkness in their world, but will their love be strong enough to save their pack and each other?

Do you believe in ghosts?
Yes. I even think I've seen a few. :) All those ghost programs on TV (Esp Ghosthunters) are my guilty pleasure. No one knows what happens after you die. So why can't ghosts be an option? And here's your random sidenote for the day - I teach physics as a class. One of the laws of energy is that it can change form, but it can't be created or destroyed. Why can't a soul be a form of energy? (I'm using this idea in a new book I'm writing. Can you tell?)

What does your significant other and family think of your writing career?
My family has always been supportive, and I love them for that. No one has ever pulled me aside and asked me what I was thinking. Strangely enough, I think my grandmother is the most vocal supporter. If she doesn't get emails regularly about what I'm working on, I get phone calls demanding to know why I've stopped. (even if I haven't!) As for signifigant other, I haven't found one yet. I'm thinking he got lost on his way here and refuses to stop and ask for directions. (Typical male.) lol

What was one of the most surprising things you learned while writing your books?

That sometimes my Muse sticks more in there than I realized was possible. Extra characters, plot lines, twists. And that I have the bad habit of creating secondary characters that I sometimes end up liking more than the primaries. I also have discovered that a villan I created for a particular story is actually one of my favorite characters. He will probably, sadly, never appear in a story because I like him too much to kill him, and he's just so dark he'd have to die.

How do you describe your writing style?

Early Pollock? lol. I'm not sure.

Plotter or Pantser? Why?

Panster. Mainly because even when I try to outline, I end up changing so much by the time I look at the outline again its useless. That's not to say I don't have a goal in mind - I do. I know what key plot points I want to hit. Its just that I'm not good with planning how I'm going to get there. Usually because I never get there the way I think I will. The only exception to that is a middle grade mystery I just wrote. That one I wrote half and then plotted the rest and mostly stuck to it - just because if I didn't, I was afraid I'd screw up the mystery part.

Tell us about your family.

I'm the oldest and I have one brother. He's an engineer. When the technology gods get angry, I call him. My parents are both in education (see where I get it?) my mom is a librarian and my dad is also a high school Tech Ed teacher. They're awesome and I love them to bits. And I have a cat named Molly. She's spoiled rotten, but I'm getting better about it.

Do you use a pen name? If so, how did you come up with it?

I do. Because I teach in a small town, and sometimes romance authors are not always thought of highly (annoying, but true) I thought it better. I have bigger battles to fight than what I do with my free time. I also write YA/MG under my real name, so it helps keep things separate. How did I come up with it? Ellen is a great Aunt's name, and Keener is a relative's name on the other side of the family.

Do you listen to music while writing? If so what?

Yes. Lots of different types, but mostly rock, steampunk, josh groban, and a lot of soundtrack and classical. It really depends on the book, scene, or mood (or any combination thereof)